Americans in Oxford

Last week, following his annual custom, Dr. Frank Aydelotte, President of Swarthmore College and American Secretary to the Rhodes Scholarship Trust, announced the election of 32 Rhodes Scholars from 32 states. The scholars elected were given proper publicity in their college newspapers, where, in most cases, their names had appeared before. Each one was, by definition, a male citizen of the U. S., over 19 and under 25 years old, above sophomore standing in some recognized, degree-granting U. S. college or university. In addition each had been chosen to go to Oxford, on the money willed for this purpose by famed Diamond-miner Cecil Rhodes, because he had shown himself excellent in all or some of three qualities: a) character, b) scholarship, c) athletic prowess. Here the necessary likenesses ended. But, unless this 32 is unlike any that has gone before it, most of its members will feel and cause a vague dissatisfaction while they are at Oxford and when they leave Oxford they will not have settled the interminable discussion as to whether Rhodes scholars enjoy or derive profit from their three years there.

When a wise youth enters a U. S. college he soon loses any uncouth and ridiculous characteristics which he may possess and begins to conform to the collegiate prototype which, though nonexistent, is easily recognisable. Not so when he enters Oxford. Buoyed up by the feeling that he has already made a success of himself, he cannot easily forgive the apathy which British Oxonians feel towards him. This is at the source of an annoyance, to which there are many tributaries. In some cases the annoyance dries up. In others it may flood into a letter, such as that of an "American Oxonian" which was recently published by the London Daily Express, saying that "these scholars are nearly always men from the provinces and quite lacking in cosmopolitan experience. . . ."

In point of fact, too much is expected of Rhodes scholars and too many generalizations are made concerning them. It is an argument that quickly comes down to a question of individuals. If William A. Breyfogle, elected this year from New Hampshire, is an enormous and conceited jackanapes, he will surely be unpopular and a discredit to the U. S. while at Oxford, and a useless citizen, talking through his nose, when he comes back. But if, on the other hand, he is intelligent and sensitive, he will find, clinging to Oxford like the thick leaves along its walls, a glory that is green in every year. He will soon walk without nervousness and without arrogance along its tonsured lawns. He will drink, perhaps, at bump suppers until he has become intoxicated. On his individual behavior as on the particular behavior of his 31 merry or pious, ugly or presentable, agile or clumsy, drunken or abstaining, riotous or serene companions, will depend the success of this latest batch of U. S. scholars in Oxford.